You most likely received a canned message from InTicketing telling you that the STEP program was closed, please visit ePlaya for all the buying/selling of tickets. Your tickets are no less 'non-transferable' than they were before you got here. Read this post

It would create a lot of good will, if all Will Call tickets were now made transferable in the same way - The old rules are no longer necessary because scalping is no longer a problem - To make people get stuck with STEP tickets, considering that 1000 tickets were released on August 3rd, and considering the fact that links to sell were not sent out to Step Buyers until they were requested, and sometimes only after several days, seems unfair to me. (The instructions said that "have ticket" links would be sent out in February. - A "Have ticket" link should at the very least have been included with every purchase through Step.

What would make most sense to me (although maybe I just don't know why this wouldn't work) would be to have all tickets submitted to the STEP program available in a mass sale like that on the 3rd.

If confirmation of the authenticity of tickets were easy enough, I wouldn't even see a serious need to stop accepting new tickets for sale. If someone wants to sell their ticket on August 20th and someone is still willing to buy it, why not let the sale be handled by Burning Man so everything is done smoothly and securely?

I can't speak for inticketing, but the Burningman offices in San Francisco are probably almost a ghost town. For some wacky reason they all go to Nevada this time of year. And those who stay behind are probably up to their necks in other logistics.

The Lady with a Lamprey

"The powerful are exploiting people, art and ideas, and this leads to us plebes debating how to best ration ice.Man, no wonder they always win....." Lonesomebri

It would be easy to hire staff that have no plans to attend Burning Man to handle tickets all the way thru the event. So the "draw the line somewhere / gone to the playa" excuse is not valid, unless the LLC's intention is to allow the situation we have now.

And if tickets are now everywhere and scalpers are no longer a problem, then why not open STEP tickets to transfers? This is beginning to look like a plan by the LLC to pocket some money at the expense of the burning man community. I feel more than ever the criticisms Chicken John had about the LLC are more true than ever.

You do realize that hiring people who don't go to the burn would be regarded as selling out by many people?And poor Chicken John, still beating that same drum. The event was going to be irrevocably changed once enough people started attending and people started dying... He'd be better off thinking of this as the Son of Burningman. Maybe even the Grandson of Burningman. So, when BLM started asking for permits and EAs it was going to go to someone who could produce them. Whether Larry Harvey and the other LLC members were best suited is an unanswerable question. But the fact that 15 years later it's still going on is a powerful argument that they were in the running. And I have no idea what sort of behind the scenes stuff went on.Anyway, the idea that any significant amount of money was made by this closing the STEP cue when there were still people who perhaps were going to change their minds at the last minute is, to me, laughable. Remember, only 2,000 ticket requests were registered in STEP and far fewer were sold through it. And the number of those who couldn't go at the last minute? It has to be less than 100. Divide that pot by six people and it's not worth putting the event and community at risk.

The Lady with a Lamprey

"The powerful are exploiting people, art and ideas, and this leads to us plebes debating how to best ration ice.Man, no wonder they always win....." Lonesomebri

Nobody would call hiring burners to work in the SF office during the event as selling out. Where do you get the 2000 request number from? I can believe only 2000 offers, but not requests. Let's say 450 people get screwed by STEP's policy (0.75% of the population) due to illness, family crisis, job conflicts, transportation issues, financial crisis, serious personal/relationship problems, whatever. That's $175,500 that the LLC gets to pocket, easy motivation for what they did.

The only way I can believe there was a very low number of STEP requests is that people are much smarter than I would guess, and they thought they would be totally screwed if they suddenly couldn't attend at the last moment... and balked.

Pink, there are people in the BMan SF office dealing with stuff, but obviously not anything related to STEP.

The infrastructure has to be there no matter what, depending on how many tickets are sold. If 3k people never make it to the event for whatever reason they don't send back some shitters and get their money back or cut back on the fireworks and explosions or send a bunch of cops home. Just go to the event and quit yer whining, we got shit to do!

devachanlounge wrote: That's $175,500 that the LLC gets to pocket, easy motivation for what they did.

The only way I can believe there was a very low number of STEP requests is that people are much smarter than I would guess, and they thought they would be totally screwed if they suddenly couldn't attend at the last moment... and balked.

Hmm. I would think that after the dust settles (giggle), that the org would refund the unused STEP tickets. My friend some years ago forgot ALL 4 tickets at home (about 600 miles away) for his group. He didn't realize it until they were turning off they hwy. This was at time when you could walk up and buy a ticket at the gate, so they had to buy four tickets at full price (I think $300+) and then they sent the 4 unused tickets and a receipt back to the org and he got a refund. Of course this is a story I heard, but a good source (the guy who shelled out over $1000 at the gate).

All these conspiracy theories really crack me up. Like the org is trying to get your $390.

OK. Well maybe they are trying to get your $390. But really, they are going to scheme and plan to screw burners with the STEP?! This was the first time they did anything like this. There were bound to be hiccups.

And on another note: I am tickled with how many people got tickets in STEP and from my outside perspective, I think STEP was wildly successful.